Jordan imports Iraqi oil with $16 discount on Brent price per barrel — energy minister

AMMAN — Jordan receives Iraqi oil with a discount of $16 from the price of Brent crude per barrel to cover the difference of transport costs and deviations in specifications, Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Hala Zawati said on Tuesday.

The minister’s remarks came during an interview with the Jordan News Agency, Petra, regarding the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in 2019, under which Jordan buys 10,000 barrels of crude oil per day from Iraq, transported by land in a back-and-forth trip estimated at about 2,550 kilometres.

From September 2019 until the end of November 2020, Jordan imported about 3.471 million barrels, and under the terms of the MoU, Jordan shall provide oil tankers to transport crude oil from Baiji area in Iraq to the Jordan Petroleum Refinery Company in Zarqa, Zawati said.

In this regard, she said that the Iraqi oil exports cover 7 per cent of the Kingdom’s daily oil needs.

The minister pointed out that the MoU was signed to bolster imports via land, which will result in rehabilitating roads and serve the interests of the two countries’ tanker fleets.

Jordan and Iraq last week, during an official visit of a delegation headed by Prime Minister and Minister of Defence Bisher Al Khasawneh to Baghdad, agreed to renew the MoU to import Iraqi oil for one year.